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Third in my series of lists of the senses is smell. Mostly in memory of that sense which our family lost last week when we all developed head colds of varying degrees. (Cue the Dies Irae.) My first list was sight; the second list, sound.
Without further ado, I give you scents I want to experience before I die:
- That baby-smell on the top of a grandbaby's head
- Sweet-shrub wafting through my open bedroom window on a warm spring morning
- White Shoulders as I nuzzle in for a hug (my grandmother's signature)
- Chanel No. 5 as I nuzzle in for a hug (my mother's signature)
- Mrouzia in Marrakesh
- Rogan josh outside Lakshmana temple in Khajuraho
- Spruce and firs giving way to glaciers in Denali
- Varnish remover while refinishing an antique [fill in the blank] by myself
- Lavender fields in Provence
- Body oil with patchouli being massaged onto me while at a beach-front spa in the Caribbean
Coming up with scents to experience is quite difficult. Knowing what I want to do or see is easy; but how does one describe a new scent? Today's list was very challenging. That will be your challenge now -- what scents do you want to experience?
A day late and a menu plan short; or, better late than never. My plan of getting the weekly menu plan done yesterday went up in smoke on Saturday night when I received an email requesting an interview.
I am the cavalry. I'm the one who gets called up to the front when the financial need arises. The need arose when Finola got into such a prestigious private college. College was in our budget plans. But we just need a little extra for the private school part.
My job search had not been going very well for several months. It's very difficult to get to the interview stage when online applications sort potential candidates based on certain words or phrases used in the answers. It's like a guessing game to figure out what the computers might be looking for.
Finding a job is always about who you know. Mr. Gaelic's colleague (Mr. A) passed along a copy of my resume to the son-in-law (Mr. B) of the colleague's (Mr. A's) former boss who passed it along to the chief of staff (Mr. C) of the man (Mr. D) I want to work for. Since I have been a full-time mother for the past 13+ years, I needed to find out what has changed in my field in the meantime as well as find out a bit about Mr. D so that I know what he's looking for in an employee. After church yesterday, the afternoon was spent researching all sorts of information and biographical sketches. Never go to an interview unprepared.
That's my excuse for not getting my menu plan posted on a Sunday as I have in the past.
- Monday
- Breakfast: grapefruit, toast
- Supper: potluck (where did all that food come from?)
- Tuesday
- Breakfast: cereal
- Supper: meatloaf, mashed potatoes, broccoli
- Wednesday
- Breakfast: oatmeal
- Supper: steak, baked potatoes (meat co-op delivery day!)
- Thursday
- Breakfast: cinnamon toast
- Supper: baked beans, dirty rice, fried okra, cornbread
- Friday
- Breakfast: cream of wheat
- Supper: cedar-plank salmon, roasted root vegetables, lentil salad
- Saturday
- Breakfast: cereal (have to be at church at 7:30 for meal delivery at a retirement home)
- Supper: pizza for girls, eat out with Mr. Gaelic (date night)
- Sunday
- Breakfast: bacon, eggs, grits, toast
- Dinner: roast chicken, green peas, mashed acorn squash, dinner rolls
Wow! I didn't realize just how busy this coming Saturday is until now. 7:30 a.m. meal delivery (similar to Meals on Wheels), 9:30 Deirdre's Girl Scout troop cleanup (at a different retirement home), also at 9:30 Deirdre's Girl Scout home-baked cookie drop-off (as a fund-raiser but not the official boxed Girl Scout cookies yet - those are being sold by our troops beginning December 22nd), 11:00 local charity pick-up of our old mattress and box spring (same group as is organizing the early morning meal delivery), 6:00 p.m. Deirdre to babysit, and finally Time To Be Determined date with Mr. Gaelic (whom I haven't seen much of lately due to his travelling on business).
Whew! I'm tired just typing that. Good thing it's potluck tonight and I don't have to think about cooking.
The curtain rises on the third act of the Noël Coward play to a round of applause for the aesthetically deco set design of 1930s New York City. It’s all black and silver and gray and white and polished and mirrored. The illusion of the play is almost complete. Until my eyes fall upon two chairs with asymmetrically curved backs.
If you’re not familiar with “Design for Living”, it’s a silken comedy centering around the lives and loves of Gilda, Leo, and Otto. Act I – Gilda is living with Leo’s best friend Otto in a Parisian walkup with chipped plaster and grimy tilt-out windows. Leo is the now-successful playwright, Otto the struggling painter, Gilda the muse. It’s made known that Leo spent the night with Gilda while Otto was away. Act II – Gilda is living with Leo in a London flat with marbled columns and a maid. Otto returns, a successful painter who has been living in New York. While Leo is away, Otto spends the night with Gilda. But then runs off with Ernest, another mutual but much older friend. Act III – Gilda is married to Ernest when Leo and Otto both return and jointly demand Gilda return to them. Not to one or the other, but to both of them, jointly.
What I’m leaving out is the overt homosexuality that closes Act II as Leo and Otto decide they belong together since neither one can have Gilda. It’s the classic love-triangle in which, at the end, everyone wins.
The daughter of the prop manager of the theatre is my eldest daughter’s best friend. We’ve been to their house on numerous occasions. So as the curtain rises at the beginning of Act III, I recognize those two chairs from the prop manager’s own living room. Just reupholstered. And as the characters talk about the furnishings of the apartment being for sale, I can’t help but wonder what the date will be for this year’s backstage sale of props and costumes. That lime green deco dress in Act III would be the coolest outfit for my husband’s office Christmas party.
